Decade-Old Object Causes Woman Severe Stomach Pains

The list of people who have swallowed rather dubious objects is very large and it gets updated regularly. Over the years, doctors have struggled to remove foreign objects from people’s stomachs and things like bobby pins, toothbrushes and even cellphones have become part of everyday life. The case of a 30-year old woman from Australia will surely make this comprehensive list too. She arrived at a hospital suffering from severe abdominal pains which came out of nowhere. According to a medical report from Monday, the woman had a quicker heart rate and an inflamed abdominal wall membrane. However, everything else seemed to be perfectly normal.

A brace wire

While all her tests came out normal, doctors started looking for other causes for this severe pain she was experiencing. She hadn’t had surgery in recent years. So, they also eliminated the theory according to which a doctor had left something inside her after the surgery. They solved the mystery after a CT scan unveiled a metal wire in the lady’s stomach. More precisely, the metallic object was stuck inside her intestines and was causing that horrible pain. Moreover, it had been there for about ten years.

According to what the doctors revealed, that wire came from a dental brace. A few years ago, she used to wear the braces and she probably accidentally swallowed this metallic part. The doctors also explained that the foreign object caused a condition called volvulus. This caused her intestines to twist around each other and triggered unbearable abdominal pains. It’s also interesting that the 30-year old woman admitted wearing braces about a decade ago, but she doesn’t remember ever swallowing them. She also reportedly didn’t lose parts of it over that period of time. According to one of her doctors, the case is unusual because people don’t normally ingest something like that. Also, parts of braces don’t usually break off.

Not the only such case

Actually, the list of cases in which people have swallowed bizarre objects is very long. There’s even a comprehensive list which details the weirdest such cases. Over the years, people have swallowed lighters, pens, and even SpongeBob pendants. Recently, in May, another case made headlines. A little girl from Texas had swallowed a fidget spinner, a very popular toy.